Of Stars and Of Darkness
by CelticQuailKnight
Summary: Kirby and Gooey reunite after Gooey's long and mysterious disappearance, and spend time eating s'mores and simply enjoying each other's company. While their friendship is reaffirmed, Gooey can't help but feel that he's going to be letting Kirby down in ways that neither of the can really control. Not that he can tell his friend this.


Hello people! Guess what? I LIVE!

And... oh... oh my god

Are you telling me that Celtic wrote a Kirby fic that DOES NOT HAVE META KNIGHT APPEAR ANYWHERE IN IT?

Well it's officially the end of the world and we are all going to die. This will be the last thing you ever read and it's probably not worth it XD

* * *

The night air was pleasantly cool, disrupted only by a gentle, swaying breeze and the snaps and pops of a fire.

It was a bonfire, burning bright and warm in a shallow pit, feeding hungrily on sticks and chunks of bark. The flames leapt and danced, tiny though the fire was, and the sounds and heat were very calming in comparison to the liveliness of the burning.

Sitting near the fire were two small figures.

The first was a creature almost perfectly round, with dark, oval eyes. These eyes reflected the flames like a mirror, willingly letting the fire twist and surge into their depths.

The second was round too, but a softer shape. More like an oval, sitting low to the ground, blending in neatly with the shadows.

Both of them were watching the firelight.

"Hey, um, you want another s'more?" Kirby asked, turning towards his companion.

Gooey looked up brightly.

"Yes please!" He bubbled, his tongue sticking comically out of his mouth.

Kirby laughed and picked up a longer, sharpened stick.

"I'm really glad you came back, you know," he said, stuffing a plump marshmallow on the end of the stick, "Even if… well… you can't tell me exactly where you went or anything…" He trailed off a bit, smile faltering slightly.

Gooey's smiled followed suit, and for a moment, he looked quite sad.

"I…" he drooped, "I'm sorry, Kirby."

"No, no! It's okay! I mean, everyone's got secrets and stuff, I get it! Just… I was… kind of worried when you just… vanished, you know?" He said honestly, spinning the marshmallow over the edge of the fire.

Gooey didn't say anything for a minute.

"I worried that I'd… done something wrong, or something. Or maybe you were in trouble." Kirby continued, looking thoughtful. "I looked for you everywhere, like I told you."

"Yeah…"

"But I could never find you. You were really just… gone. You completely disappeared." Kirby shook his head. "It's kind of cool, I guess. I probably can't vanish without a trace like that. It was like you…"

"...Just disappeared into thin air." Gooey finished for him, sounding dejected. "It _was_ like that."

Kirby met his gaze for a moment.

"Hey."

Gooey stared at him sadly.

"You're my friend, Gooey. I trust you." Kirby affirmed. "I might not understand why you can't tell me what happened back then or how you came back now, but… if you really feel like you can't tell me, then… that's okay. You _did_ come back, and you're okay and you're here with me again. That's what really matters."

Kirby smiled. A real smile, that curled gently over his face and lit up in his eyes.

And Gooey realized that he was smiling, too.

"Kirby…" He perked up, giving a sort of bounce, his amorphous body rippling. "Thank you… You're a good friend. That means a lot to me."

For a time, they were quiet again, watching the marshmallow cooking itself into a sweet, squishy blob, sparks rising from the fire below it and into the night sky.

"How's this?" Kirby asked, waving the stick.

Gooey eyed the marshmallow hungrily, eyes sparkling.

"Perfect!" He declared, and Kirby laughed and pulled it away from the fire.

He handed the stick to Gooey, who grasped it with his tongue, and then Kirby carefully assembled the rest of the s'more around the cardinal center, squishing it down and then pulling it smoothly off the stick. Then they traded, Kirby getting back the stick to load up with marshmallows for himself, and Gooey happily getting his treat.

The blob stuffed the whole thing in his mouth with a look of pure glee, humming in appreciation.

"I'm glad it's such a nice night." He remarked after he'd swallowed.

"Dreamland's pretty good for that." Kirby agreed, glancing upwards at the clear sky, almost light with its abundance of stars. "I've been to lots of other planets before but… I still think that my home is the prettiest. Sure, there's tons of cool stuff out there, but I really love the stars from home."

"...I've been to lots of planets, too." Gooey admitted. "And if it's stars you want, then you're right; Popstar does have a good view for them. I'm not sure why…" He wondered aloud, "Must have _something_ to do with your atmosphere… but I don't know." His expression seemed both puzzled and… a little unnerved.

Kirby frowned a bit.

"Don't you… like looking at stars like this?" He asked, feeling like something was wrong.

Gooey was quick to backtrack.

"Oh, I do! I do like it, yeah! It's just…" He seemed almost nervous, or maybe embarrassed. "It's… a lot to take in? There's just… so many of them." He sounded almost in awe, craning his body to look skywards, eyes wide. "You're right; on most other planets you can't see this many from the surface. There's just… so much more light here." He said eventually. "And I'm used to… more of… that dark stuff."

"...Oh." Kirby pulled his marshmallow back from the flames. "Do… do you like stargazing?"

"I like watching the night sky." Gooey allowed, sounding thoughtful. He broke out into another silly smile. "But I'm having much more fun just being here with you! I usually had to look alone."

Kirby laughed as he put his s'more together and then stuffed it hastily in his mouth. After a moment he chewed it, the crackers crunching in his mouth.

Gooey giggled.

"I thought you were gonna swallow it whole!"

Kirby gulped it down and laughed with him.

"Nope! Sometimes you have to savor things. It's a lot easier with teeth, though, I gotta say." He grinned, exposing his rows of tiny white teeth, some of which were surprisingly sharp.

"Oooo, I'm jealous!" Gooey said with a joking tone.

"It was really weird when they grew in, but it's much easier to eat slowly now!"

"I bet! It probably tastes better, too!" Gooey reached with his tongue for an uncooked marshmallow and popped it directly into his mouth.

Kirby lay back on the grass, looking fondly up at the sky. After a moment, Gooey looked up as well.

The fire was beginning to calm, though it still shot golden sparks up into the dark, and the crackles and mild scent of the burning wood were still present. A lone firefly blinked its way over the grass somewhere behind the fire.

All was quiet.

"...Hey Gooey?" Kirby said, eyes still glued on the starry ceiling above them.

"Yeah?"

"Do you know any constellations?"

Gooey hesitated. _Did_ he? It wasn't the sort of thing his… type of people, (he was _not_ going to say family, because that just… wasn't right.) would have much interest in knowing. In fact, it seemed like the kind of thing they'd… strongly disdain. Something they'd forbid.

"Um…"

...But surely he'd learned _some_ after all this time away from… them, right?

"I… I'm not sure." He admitted softly, after thinking about it.

Kirby pushed himself up until he was sitting.

"Really?" He asked, looking mildly shocked.

Gooey felt himself blush.

"Um, yeah… it's just… not really the kind of thing that we-er… um… Keeping track of… _stars_ and all that, it's…"

"Do you… want to?" Kirby asked carefully. When Gooey just stared at him, he kept going. "Like… if you were interested or something, I know a bunch. I could show you, and teach you how to find them and stuff… Only if you want."

"Is that… like a thing that friends do?" Gooey asked curiously.

"It can be! Friends… friends do… whatever they want to do. Like sitting out here and making s'mores together!" Kirby chirped.

The soft smile reemerged on Gooey's dark face.

"I think I'd like that, then."

He hopped over until he was sitting right next to Kirby.

"Should I lie down?"

"Sure! It'll make it easier to look. If you stand looking up for too long, it can get kind of sore." Kirby laughed, lying back down himself.

Gooey followed suit, nestling beside Kirby as the light from the fire continued to fade. He glanced down at it consideringly.

"Should we build the fire back up?" He asked.

"Not unless you want to." Kirby said. "It's gonna be a lot easier to see all the stars if it's darker out."

"But… we can see them already." Gooey pointed out, confused.

"Well yeah," Kirby agreed, "But it'll get a lot better when it's totally dark."

"Oh."

So they waited, as the fire died down to a few smaller flames. Popping became clicks, and whistles shrank to wheezing sighs as the sparks came fewer and fewer, dying off into a growing trail of smoke.

The smaller the fire grew, the bolder the sky became.

Gooey found himself staring into what looked like an endless plane of nothing but patches of dark and deeper dark, spattered over with points of sidereal light.

Beside him, Kirby sighed in a way that seemed utterly relaxed.

He turned to look at his friend, and indeed, he looked completely calm. Peaceful, even. Then Kirby tensed.

"Oh, look!" He jabbed one small, pink hand at the sky excitedly.

"What!? What is it?" Gooey immediately looked back up, scanning the void for anything out of the ordinary.

"A shooting star! Didn't you see it?"

"No…?" Gooey replied.

"You missed it?" Kirby asked, looking over.

Gooey nodded.

"Huh. That's okay! People always talk about how they're really rare and how it's good luck to spot them, but that's really not true."

"It's not?"

"Yeah. At least, about them being rare. I dunno if they're lucky or not." Kirby laughed a bit to himself. "But they're flying around all the time! The longer I look out here, the more I end up seeing. Keep looking up on a clear night like this and you'll see tons of them!"

Intrigued, Gooey looked back up. He watched and he waited for a few minutes with nothing, but suddenly a white streak shot across his vision.

It was small, and very thin, and it lasted only a second before it was gone without the faintest trace, but just for that second, there it was.

A tiny, white scratch cut across the shimmering globe of night.

"I saw one!" Gooey cried.

"See! I told you!" Kirby exclaimed. "They're all over the place, but they're so fun to see."

It struck Gooey as a little funny how something so temporary, so insignificant, could have the impact that it did, but… he supposed that the stars themselves were the same way.

For as he came to realize, their bonfire had sputtered out into nothing more than a pile of smoldering, red coals, and the trail of smoke was winding up into the heavens like an endlessly long, wavering tail. And without the shield of the fire's light, without the safety net of that warm, burning glow, they lay alone, in a dark, silent place, utterly exposed to the brilliant, cold light of the stars.

It was overwhelming to see them all.

Otherworldly.

And… somewhat sad, because he knew that somehow, some way, despite how he felt unprotected and almost vulnerable underneath their brilliance, he knew this was where Kirby felt most at home.

He was basking in the starlight the way a cat would stretch out in a pool of sun. He drank it in through the darkness of his eyes and reflected it back for the world to see.

Kirby part of the stars. He was a piece of the stars. This was where he belonged.

And he kept his promise. After a little while, he started pointing out the constellations, tracing them with his arms and telling Gooey stories about their names and their meanings. Some of them, Gooey was pleased to note, he was familiar with, or had at least heard of in passing. Many more were new to him, and he tried his best to commit all their shapes to memory, so that someday, when he was alone, he could maybe look up at the stars by himself, and not feel… so lost.

But he knew it wasn't like he'd ever feel really comfortable with them.

While Kirby lay there staring in awe up at the stars, Gooey huddled beside him, his eyes trained not upon the stars, but on the darkness between them.


End file.
